John Byrom, John Byrom of Kersal, or John Byrom of Manchester was an English poet, the inventor of a revolutionary system of shorthand and later a significant landowner. He is most remembered as the writer of the lyrics of Anglican hymn "Christians, awake, salute the happy morn", which was supposedly a Christmas gift for his daughter.
Portrait of Byrom as a young man
Kersal Cell
Newspaper advertisement for Byrom's shorthand system from the Daily Gazetteer, 1741
Byrom Hall, Lowton, Greater Manchester
Shorthand is an abbreviated symbolic writing method that increases speed and brevity of writing as compared to longhand, a more common method of writing a language. The process of writing in shorthand is called stenography, from the Greek stenos (narrow) and graphein. It has also been called brachygraphy, from Greek brachys (short), and tachygraphy, from Greek tachys, depending on whether compression or speed of writing is the goal.
Dutch stenography using the "System Groote"
Sun Guoting's Treatise on Calligraphy, an example of cursive writing of Chinese characters
Tombstone of Heinrich Roller, inventor of a German shorthand system, with a sample of his shorthand
Yiddish shorthand